Implement Sachar report and see Modi reaching Delhi: Shourie

New Delhi, Dec 20 (UNI) BJP Rajya Sabha MP and former Union Minister Arun Shourie has said nobody would be able to stop Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi from coming to power at Delhi once the Sachar Committee's report was implemented.

''Never give that to one religion which you cannot give to all religions,'' he said while speaking at a panel discussion titled 'Hindutva and Radical Islam: Are they the same?' on the release of columnist Tavleen Singh's book 'Political &Incorrect: The Real India, Warts and All' here last evening.

On the allegation of political parties using religion, Mr Shourie shot back, ''During the Gujarat poll campaign, Modi was criticised for talking only about development. It was only when Congress president Sonia Gandhi called him 'maut ka saudagar' that he reacted to it. It is Modi's critics who have made him a national figure. '' Mr Shourie also asserted that people frightened of Hindutva should see the causes which encouraged it and called for a similar approach to be adopted towards radical Islam.

Besides, Mr Shourie denounced renowned painter M F Hussain, wondering why he was ''never even once inspired in his 90 years of existence to paint the luminous face of Prophet Mohammed or for that matter, the revered wives of the Prophet'' even as he went around painting the Hindu Goddesses in the nude.

''Naturally the people will feel that he is pandering to one side only.'' To this, Congress General Secretary Salman Khurshid, who was also on the panel, retorted by saying that no Muslim had, however, ever praised the controversial paintings of Hussain nor did anybody said of dispalying copies of them but when Salman Rushdie wrote 'The Satanic Verses', there were people who came forward to publish it and distribute its copies.

Mr Khushid was vehement in his criticism of the general perceptions prevailing about Muslims in the country. ''How often have you heard of the term nationalist Muslim? Why do Muslims have to be either progressive or conservative?'' More UNI